As we all know, tissue damage from hypoxic ischemic injury during a heart attack leads to ongoing problems, like congestive heart failure.
Once heart muscle is damaged, neighboring healthy tissue will become damaged too, due to the “bystander effect.” This can turn what might be relatively minor heart damage into major, life-threatening damage.
So the question becomes: is it possible to stop this “bystander effect” in its tracks?
Medical researchers at Virginia Tech think they’ve discovered something that will turn the answer from a “no” to a “yes.”
A study published recently in the Journal of the American Heart Association explains how research initially meant to develop solutions for chronic, non-healing wounds led to this finding.
Robert Gourdie, director of the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute, says he and his team discovered a peptide, alphaCT1, which holds great promise for skin regrowth.
That was a decade ago and seemed exciting enough. So exciting, it led Gourdie to establish a new company to bring alphaCT1 to the market. They are now in phase III clinical trials for wound healing.
In the process, they stumbled upon a variant of alphaCT1 – alphaCT11 – that was even more effective.
Knowing the mechanisms for skin regrowth and repair are relevant to heart tissue, Gourdie and his team started experimenting.
Keeping isolated mouse hearts beating for several hours using perfusion, the team discovered AlphaCT11 actually prevented the bystander effect. AlphaCT1 didn’t, but alphaCT11 did, even when given a full 20 minutes after the initial ischemia.
They knew they were onto something with enormous potential.
"AlphaCT11 could provide the basis for a new way to treat heart attacks and prevent the spread of damage that occurs immediately after a heart attack," said Gourdie.
Lots of research lies ahead. This is by no means the end of the road, rather the beginning of what might turn out to be an impactful treatment for millions. Stay tuned!
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With more than 35 new ASCs opening in the first quarter of 2018, business continues to boom for many ambulatory surgery centers across the nation. But, some states are more favorable than others when it comes to where ASC doctors choose to practice medicine.
Those in the surgical arena are likely aware of the recent propofol shortage. This resulted when Teva Pharmaceuticals, which supplied approximately 40% of the propofol used in the U.S. announced that they would no longer produce the drug. This decision came after they were ordered to pay $356 million to a patient who developed Hepatitis C after his doctor reused the same single-use vial on several different patients. You can read about that controversial decision as well as the resultant drug shortage at the in this article at the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI). Because the propofol vials are designed for single use only, disposing of unused medication led to a great deal of waste, particularly in ambulatory surgical centers where surgeries tend to be of a shorter duration and less of the drug is therefore needed. David Bernard, of Outpatient Surgery Magazine, reports that in response to this problem, German drug manufacturer Fresenius Kabi is now offering Diprivan, its injectable emulsion of propofol, in 10mL vials, the smallest dosage of single-use vial ever created. In addition to eliminating waste, this smaller dosage vial is likely to reduce the chances of patients being infected due to reuse.
The laparoscopic power morcellators provided by Johnson & Johnson enabled surgeons to perform procedures such as hysterectomies with minimal invasiveness. Unfortunately, an estimated 1 in 350 women undergoing hysterectomies have an undiagnosed case of uterine cancer, and when the uterus is broken into pieces by this device, it can cause the cancer to spread. This is what happened to a Harvard anesthesiologist and medical professor who underwent a laparoscopic hysterectomy and subsequently petitioned the FDA to put an end to the use of this method. Accordingly, the FDA began conducting a study, the findings of which were published in July. As a result of this study, the FDA recommended that use of morcellators be suspended or restricted. Following this report, Johnson & Johnson announced that it will no longer produce the devices and has recommended that customers return them. However, the wisdom of this decision is being challenged by many in the medical field who feel that the potential dangers are not as significant as the FDA is reporting. Outpatient Magazine reports on this argument in an article entitled “Johnson & Johnson Asks Customers to Return Morcellators.”
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